Pre-empting
a world disaster
The junior doctor was clean
shaven. I pictured a bearded version
on annual leave by the coast. In
Mablethorpe, with his wife and children,
not realising this type of holiday was
old fashioned, there was more hedonism
available on the Mediterranean,
they didn’t yet have a pet poodle. He was
alarmed when I told him I was a
global solipsist. A pretentious term I
had learnt in fresher’s week at College.
I couldn’t hear him as he spoke
softly, gently so politely about loneliness,
depression, my diet, if I heard voices.
A stylus was following its groove in vinyl,
playing the Lutoslawski piano concerto, a work
of profound warmth, normally stored
in its radiant blue record sleeve. As the
other patients woke they imagined
loops of rope above their bed.
One by one they descended
the stairs. They’d all had a bad night’s
sleep, like wolverines on washing lines.
But I watched the television, which
was full of violence. I was only waiting
for a calamity, some consequence
unpreventable even by one with
professional training.
first published by Under the Radar 2014
copyright .© John Vickers
The junior doctor was clean
shaven. I pictured a bearded version
on annual leave by the coast. In
Mablethorpe, with his wife and children,
not realising this type of holiday was
old fashioned, there was more hedonism
available on the Mediterranean,
they didn’t yet have a pet poodle. He was
alarmed when I told him I was a
global solipsist. A pretentious term I
had learnt in fresher’s week at College.
I couldn’t hear him as he spoke
softly, gently so politely about loneliness,
depression, my diet, if I heard voices.
A stylus was following its groove in vinyl,
playing the Lutoslawski piano concerto, a work
of profound warmth, normally stored
in its radiant blue record sleeve. As the
other patients woke they imagined
loops of rope above their bed.
One by one they descended
the stairs. They’d all had a bad night’s
sleep, like wolverines on washing lines.
But I watched the television, which
was full of violence. I was only waiting
for a calamity, some consequence
unpreventable even by one with
professional training.
first published by Under the Radar 2014
copyright .© John Vickers